Streel
The Dictionary of Newfoundland English defines a streel as an untidy, dirty person. Used as a verb, to streel means to drag along the ground or to trail untidily.
The word was introduced to me by one of the young lawyers in our firm, herself a Newfoundlander, who came into the office somewhat bleary one morning advising that the source of her woes was that some friends had come to town, and they ended up “streeling home at four in the morning”. I could believe it.
Like so many Newfoundland words of Irish origin, streel is so self-descriptive. It’s often modified by the word sleeveen, a rogue or a rascal. To be a streeling sleeveen is about as disparaging as it gets, and one sometimes hears it the other way around, a sleevy streel.
But you don’t have to be a Newfoundlander to recognize streels or sleeveens. Sure, they have their place in good stories or in a good pub crawl. But they have no place in business or in the professions.
In the professions, all we have is our reputation, and tomorrow’s reputation is only as good as today’s reality. So a waiting room full of torn and dog-eared magazines from last year tells your client something about who you really are. Ditto for bad coffee, grumpy-frumpy receptionists, and no wifi hotspot.
Reporting letters that lack important details or are full of typos tell the client how careful you were in attending to their crucial affairs. Showing up in court looking like you slept in your suit tells the client that you really don’t care. In fact, it also tells the judge that you really don’t care. And I suppose you’re telling yourself that you really don’t care.
We can debate whether clothes make the man, but there is no debate that comporting ourselves as streels and sleeveens is not the way to build our essential reputation.